Michael Pollan Lecture.

What follows was originally posted early this morning by VictoR on the Men’s Health TNT Forum. It is worth repeating here.

Went to hear Michael Pollan lecture last night at Bellarmine University. He did not talk as long as I thought it might, but worth going to. I like his books and especially The Omnivore’s Dilemma – A Natural History of Four Meals. He talked quite a bit about how bad processed food is and why it is so profitable for the food industry. I found it interesting to note that from a box of corn flakes, the company that makes the box makes almost 3 times more money than the farmer that raised the corn. He suggested to shop and not buy anything that your grandmother or great-grandmother is some cases would not recognize and limit those to 5 ingredients. He also noted several times to stop eating before you were full. I mention this on the forum because he noted multiple times about the fear of fat and that we should not be afraid of fat, especially saturated and monounsaturated fats and processed foods, foods high in sugar and over processed ingredients and purely over eating were much more damaging….all sound familiar. He also promoted exercise. Worth hearing if you ever get a chance.

I never paid much attention to processed versus non-processed foods. I stumbled into this end of the world when I started to eat Low Carb. Most processed foods are high in carbohydrates. There is now very little food in my home which comes in a box or bag. If they do, the chances are good that they are frozen veggies, nuts or cheese.

I do not shy away from processed meats, but I do not eat a lot of them. I will have bacon, sausages or hot dogs – just not every day. Most of what I used to call sandwich meats are fresh-cut rather than processed. I have started buying nitrate/nitrite free hot dogs – but that is because my grandson can not have soy, and this was the only brand without added soy or soy lecithin.

Also, most processed foods have added soy. Once I started to understand the requisite balance between Omega 3 and Omega 6, and the reality that this balance is heavily tilted towards Omega 6, in part due to the prevalence of soy in our processed foods, it just reinforced my will to stay away from these foods. My only large source of soy is mayonnaise. I tried making my own, but just not worth the bother. Trying to find a soy free brand on the supermarket shelves is almost impossible. There is one exception to that rule: Foods marketed during the Passover holiday are soy free. There is a brand that is made with cottonseed oil only during that time of the year. Parents of children with soy allergies, are the first to hit the local supermarkets and clear the shelves of those products. I am left to control the 3-6 balancing act by the addition of Omega 3s to my diet, either in whole food form or by fish oil supplementation.

Last night was a professional association dinner meeting and lecture. Managed to keep it clean except for two tiny hors d’oeuvres. No rice, no bread, no desert – but two glasses of Cab – of course. This morning was my normal Friday morning BNI breakfast meeting. Had a large scoop of scrambled eggs and 4 slices of well done bacon. Eschewed the bread, potatoes, french toast and cut up fruit. Never a problem.